The website that we use to create & post content on the Bridge (bridgefaithcommunity.com) and the Love With A Capital L (lovewithacapitall.com) websites is called Jetpack. It’s easy and free, 2 characteristics that make it very friendly for me. Jetpack wants it’s users to post often and gives lots of tools to make that happen. One of them is a prompt (a question or an idea), and today’s is: Do you see yourself as a leader?

This is interesting, because we all can have such widely contrasting views on this question. The nature of my position at the Bridge makes it obvious for me, but how do you answer the prompt? I’ve heard the phrase, “I’m no leader,” so many times, I’d start to believe it, if it wasn’t so wrong.

I also hear “I’m not a creative person.” Where do you think these lies began? When did we first hear them? Were they something we were told? And why? Why would someone lead us to believe such false notions about ourselves?

Much of our journey of faith, following Jesus, is un-learning the nonsense we’ve been taught.

Not a creative person? If we are awake and aware, if we look around, we see the fruit of a wildly creative God. The world is exploding with color and texture and beauty and function. We are made in the image of that God. It is as if we are saying, “We are all made in His image…except for me.” It’s strange we would accept this as truth isn’t it?

As far as leadership, last week we discussed our relationships in the home and asked some very difficult questions: Are we keeping score, making long records of wrongs? Are we patient? AND would our children be the first to call us patient? Would our spouses be defending our kindness? Would they defend the words we use, or our tones? Are we proud? Would our wives or children say we need it our way? Do they think we need to control how we make a pb&j sandwich? 

If these questions are so valuable (and so hard to answer honestly), that implies that people are watching. Our children are learning from our example. Our spouses are discovering who we are, how we move, what’s important to us. All of this points to the opportunity to impact the world around us, an opportunity that is only fully realized when we acknowledge the truth of our responsibility.

At work, in the grocery stores, behind the wheel, at the gym, we are always on display. How do we speak to each other? What can the cashier at the Walmart learn about the Gospel from our marriages? From our interactions with our teenage sons & daughters? If love is patient, would someone feel loved after interacting with us? Would they feel inspired our gratitude or deflated by our sour, complaining hearts?

This is the definition of leadership, and probably we’ve closed our eyes to avoid it. Those days are over, they have to be. There’s a saying that goes, “Teach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words.” We’re all teachers, illustrators, leaders, everybody is watching. I don’t always like the prompts, they often amplify a disappointingly stark difference in perspectives between the cultural and the spiritual. What we do matters to someone, so that makes it matter to everyone. Once we see this, our vision clears to possibility. And this is how it all starts…